by Marion Meade
A weak spring sunshine covered the hills of Burgundy. For months the news that Saint Bernard would preach at Vézelay on Easter Sunday had been radiating to the far corners of the kingdom and beyond. The town bustled with the cheerful noise of a crowd on a holiday, sightseers eager to glimpse the saint and to inspect the new Cathedral of Saint Mary Magdalene, which crowned the city on the hill. As at Clermont a half century earlier, the throngs were too great to be contained under any other roof but heaven. “And since there was no place within the town which could accommodate such a large crowd, a wooden platform was erected outside in a field, so that the abbot could speak from an elevation to the people standing about.” It might have been a fairground, the field rippling with wimples and skullcaps and hoods, the platform blossoming with the colorful robes of the king and queen accompanied by their retinue of counselors and noblemen, bishops and statesmen. At the sight of Bernard mounting the dais, a tense silence descended on the crowd, for the old man, emaciated from his years of fasting, appeared close to death. Nevertheless, once he began to speak, his voice trumpeted forth loud and clear, reverberating through the crowd to tear their hearts and stir their holy rage. As the sound of his voice rang over the hillside, the words seemed, to those gathered there, as music from an angel who had suddenly dropped from the clouds. His words have not been handed down; we know only that he read the papal bull calling for a holy expedition and promising absolution for all who took the cross, but to think that he would not have embellished the papal letter with his incomparable rhetoric is inconceivable. At last, unable to restrain themselves, the people broke into discordant waves of applause and shouts of “To Jerusalem” and then there was silence once more. King Louis was moving forward to speak, but after only a few words he dissolved into the tears that came so easily to him and prostrated himself before the abbot to receive the cross.
Still under Bernard’s spell, Louis’s vassals forgot their earlier coolness in their eagerness to receive a cross from the abbot’s own wasted hands. In every dialect of Gaul, they began to cry out, “Crosses, give us crosses!” and so great was the clamor that the hills and fields and woods seemed to echo back, “Crosses!” Soon Bernard’s supply was exhausted, “and when he had sowed, rather than distributed, the parcel of crosses which he had prepared beforehand, he was forced to tear his own garments and to sow them abroad.” It went on until nightfall. The feudal lords had fallen into orderly ranks, and by the light of cressets and lanterns they waited their turn to approach the man of God. Private feuds forgotten, enemies standing shoulder to shoulder, that Sunday they were all brothers enlisting in the army of Christ. In the file could be seen Count Theobald’s eldest son, Henry; Alphonse-Jourdain, from whom Louis and Eleanor had tried to wrest Toulouse; Louis’s brother Robert, count of Dreux; Thierry, count of Flanders; Archibald of Bourbon; Enguerrand of Coucy; the king’s uncle, Count Amadeus II; the bishops of Langres, Arras, and Lisieux; and many, many others, whose names the chroniclers did not know or lacked the parchment to list.
At some point during the daylong procession, Eleanor knelt before the abbot to receive her cross. By no means was she the only woman to do so; among the noble ladies who took the cross on Easter Sunday, we know the names of Sybille of Flanders. Faydide of Toulouse, Torqueri of Bouillon, and Florine of Burgundy, and there were wives and daughters of other great lords who followed the queen’s example. Later, after the newly blessed cruciati had returned to their homes, stories were told describing Queen Eleanor and her ladies as a troop of armed Amazons. Dressed in cherry red boots and white tunics, with the crimson cross splashed across their breasts, they had galloped on white horses over the hillside at Vézelay brandishing swords and spurring the faint-hearted to heed the call of the Almighty. Or so it was said. From what most people knew of their flamboyant queen, the tale sounded completely in character, and those who had been present at Vézelay did not bother to disillusion them, indeed they themselves may have embroidered a few of the fabulous details. The stories only added to the general excitement and, for that matter, probably stimulated recruiting.
Later, Louis would be severely censured for permitting Eleanor to accompany him. The chroniclers would claim that, mistrusting the queen out of his sight, he had been motivated by burning jealousy. William of Newburgh, writing some fifty years after Vézelay, advances the theory that the king so adored his beautiful wife that he could not bear to be separated from her. A more reasonable explanation is simply that in the spring of 1145 few, except perhaps Abbot Suger, ever thought to question Eleanor’s decision to take the cross. Contrary to what is sometimes believed, there was nothing very unusual about a woman going on Crusade. During the first expedition to the Holy Land, many noble ladies accompanied their lords. Count Alphonse-Jourdain of Toulouse had been born in the East and owed his name to the fact that he had been baptized in the waters of the river Jordan. Even on the so-called People’s Crusade led by Peter the Hermit, the army of the poor was not made up principally of men; there were also a great many women and children. Throughout Eleanor’s childhood, she had grown accustomed to the sight of female pilgrims; in the spring and summer, the roads of Aquitaine had been thronged with travelers bound for Compostela or Rome or Jerusalem, and many of them were women.
But, of course, there was more to her decision. At the very word crusade, intoxicating memories moved in her mind. Despite William the Troubadour’s unfortunate experiences on the road to Jerusalem, he had managed to transcend disaster by writing of it in honeyed rhyme. Creating material for jongleur and minstrel, his odyssey had been transmuted into high adventure, and Eleanor remembered his songs with inexpressible nostalgia. With her grandfather’s Crusade had traveled one of the most famous beauties of her time, the Margravine Ida of Austria, who had raised a contingent of troops and rode at their head. The fact remained that the Margravine had been among those lost during the massacre, but Eleanor no doubt preferred to believe that this admirable woman had somehow escaped. That a similar fate might await women during the Second Crusade seemed absurd. By the middle of the twelfth century, pilgrimages to the Holy Land were no longer novel; in fact, they had become the medieval version of the grand tour, excursions that persons of consequence undertook for their own spiritual and cultural enrichment.
The desire to visit the Holy Land was widespread and deeply implanted in the nature of medieval men and women. To many Christians, the desire to worship Christ in Jerusalem was an overriding emotion that enabled them to endure the dangers of a medieval journey, to face slow death from starvation or sudden death by murder en route, or to risk capture and enslavement by the Moslems. The reasons for taking the cross were as varied as the Crusaders themselves. For some, like Louis, the journey held out the hope of pardon from sin; for others, it was a means of escape from a dreary existence. While Eleanor would seem to fall into the latter category, she was by no means devoid of religious zeal; however, she was most religious when her interests and God’s interests happened to coincide. Bathed in extreme boredom at her drafty castle on the Seine, how she must have leaped at the opportunity to become a Crusader. What incomparable avenues opened to her, what marvels waited Beyond the Sea, where there was no rain or snow, what tales she would bring back to mesmerize her grandchildren on long winter evenings!
Her yearnings for adventure were no more suspect than Louis’s. “To him, taking the cross was a mystical adventure rather than a political move. But after a half century of rule in Jerusalem, he was convinced, as King of France, that the French crown had a messianic role to play and believed that he was following in the footsteps of Charlemagne, who, according to generally accepted tradition, had made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem.” Popular legend had it that a Christian monarch, perhaps a reincarnation of Charlemagne, would bring about the millenium by taking possession of Jerusalem. In those months after Vézelay, there could be found numerous “prophets” swearing that Louis was the king who would usher in the thousand years of peace preceding the final triumph of Jesu
s Christ.
Largely overlooked in the excitement was one crucial fact: Louis’s Crusade had arisen from dire political necessity. Not only had Jerusalem’s Queen Melisende sounded the alarm for help, but Prince Raymond of Antioch could also see calamity overtaking him unless reinforcements appeared from the West. Unlike Count Joscelin, he observed the dangers clearly, and it was only natural that he should think of his niece, the queen of the Franks. In September of that year, when Zengi was assassinated by a disgruntled servant, he believed his troubles to be over; to his consternation, however, he soon discovered that Zengi’s son, Nureddin, was no less fierce and warlike than his father, and a religious fanatic to boot. It is certain that Raymond sent his own messengers to the Capetian court, acquainting Louis and Eleanor with the details of the Turkish threat and stressing the gravity of his plight. William of Tyre relates that the prince wooed his relatives in Paris with “noble gifts and treasures of great price in the hope of winning favor.” He might have saved himself the trouble, for Eleanor and Louis needed no added inducements.
The Crusade was scheduled to depart in the spring of 1147, but in the meantime there was much to be done. More was needed than merely the approval of the pope and the promises of princes; such an enterprise would have been doomed without the support of the general populace. There is no question that Eleanor worked tirelessly to assure the success of the operation by contributing to the recruiting of soldiers and the collection of money. After returning from the stirring events at Vézelay, she immediately set off on a personal tour of Aquitaine, proclaiming tournaments to rally knights and petty castellans and renewing special privileges enjoyed by abbeys in exchange for their financial support. At Fontevrault, for instance, she guaranteed the abbey a profit of five hundred sous from a fair held in Poitiers, and similar gifts were made to Montierneuf, La Grace-Dieu, and other religious foundations. Owing to her efforts and, very likely, to her dashing example, a remarkably high proportion of the Crusaders would come from Aquitaine, among them Geoffrey de Rancon, the lord of Taillebourg castle, where she and Louis had spent their wedding night; Saldebreuil of Sanzay, whom she had made her constable; Hugh of Lusignan; and Guy of Thouars. If Bernard of Clairvaux viewed her activity as a form of backsliding from their agreement, he did not voice his objections, for at least her efforts were focused on a pious cause.
While Eleanor carried the call to arms to the southland, the indefatigable Bernard was preaching in Burgundy, Lorraine. Flanders, and finally he embarked on an extensive tour of the Rhineland. That year crops had failed in Germany, and since there was widespread famine, hunger undoubtedly moved many to take the cross in hope of winning food and riches in the East. Their emperor, Conrad of Hohenstaufen, admired Bernard, but his position in Germany remained shaky, and he had little enthusiasm for a foreign war with so many enemies in his own yard. Frail and tremulous, Bernard circled Conrad like an aging bloodhound. Time after time he petitioned the sober emperor, only to meet with polite rebuffs. Finally, at Christmas, he cornered Conrad at Speyer, and speaking as though he were Christ himself, reminded the Holy Roman emperor of all the favors heaven had showered upon him: “O man, what have I not done for thee that I ought to have done?” The next day Conrad took the cross.
Bernard had left Clairvaux in the autumn of 1146, and he would not return until spring of the following year. So spectacular were the results of his labors that he was able to write to Pope Eugenius: “You have ordered and I have obeyed, and your authority has made my obedience fruitful. I have declared and I have spoken, and they [the Crusaders] are multiplied above number. Towns and castles are emptied, one may scarcely find one man among seven women, so many women are there widowed while their husbands are still alive.”
Enthusiasm for the Crusade could not have been called universal, however, if only because such a vast operation required unusually large sums of money. “For this purpose there was a general exaction levied throughout Gaul: neither sex, rank nor dignity was spared or excused from contributing aid to the king. For which reason his pilgrimage was followed by the imprecations of his subjects.” Despite whisperings and anger, the expedition slowly began to mobilize. There were innumerable decisions to be made: how to arrange transportation for 100,000 persons; how to assure a supply of food for a journey of nearly unimaginable distance; how to find responsible guides to convey them through strange lands. In all these matters the king displayed an uncharacteristic amount of initiative and efficiency.
The winter came, all the more bleak and devastating because so many were dreaming about a land where the sun always shone. Thirty miles south of Paris, snow drifts blanketed the fields of Étampes on February 16, 1147, as Louis’s barons and bishops arrived for a three-day conference to discuss preparations. Icy winds pierced their cloaks, and even inside near the castle’s great hearth the men shivered and the smoke-blackened tapestries billowed along the walls. Notwithstanding the weather, spirits ran exceptionally high. Louis had promised that each would have an equal voice in the planning session, a decision for which Abbot Suger and Eleanor could only feel a measure of relief. On Sunday the sixteenth, the king opened the assembly with a report on his accomplishments to date: He had received favorable responses to his requests to the Germans and Hungarians asking permission to pass through their lands and to trade at their markets. Deputies whom he had sent to the Byzantine emperor, Manuel Comnenus, and to Roger, the Norman king of Sicily, had evoked a flurry of invitations and promises, which he intended to lay before the council for discussion. This last matter occupied their attention for much of the conference because the question of route—by sea or overland through Constantinople—was of critical importance. Obsequious letters were read from Manuel Comnenus, who, despite Byzantium’s unsettling experiences with Crusaders in the past, nevertheless effusively extended hospitality and support. King Roger sent special envoys offering to transport—for a price—the army by sea.
In the lively discussion that followed, there were those who strongly favored Roger’s plan: A sea voyage would eliminate the difficulties of guiding an army down the Danube and across unknown territory into Asia Minor and, furthermore, would bypass the Greeks, of whose perfidy many Franks were convinced. Other barons preferred the land route, the same one transversed by the First Crusade, and they pointed out that Roger, presently at war with Byzantium, had only made the offer to strengthen his own position. Moreover, everyone knew the Normans were notorious for their wiliness, and many said frankly that Roger meant them no good. By process of open debate,the arguments were presented, the advantages and disadvantages thrashed out, until a majority agreed that the Crusade would travel by land. In the long run, it was safer and cheaper.
Once they had reached agreement on these arrangements, the council took up the question of who would govern the kingdom in Louis’s absence. The choice fell on Abbot Suger and on William, count of Nevers, but the latter declined by suddenly announcing his intention to enter the monastery of Chartreuse. Suger was only slightly more enthusiastic about accepting the regency, “because he considered it a burden rather than an honor.” As the meeting ended, it was decided that the Crusade would depart three months hence. The place of rendevous: Metz.
On June 11, 1147, the bells tolled until the sky above the rooftops of Saint-Denis vibrated with an endless clangor. The cathedral had been draped with flags and gonfalons, and in the blaze of thousands of candles the red crosses on pennants and tunics seemed as if they had caught fire. Pope Eugenius had crossed the Alps to officiate, and it was he who opened the small door before the high altar and, removing the silver chest containing the bones of Saint Denis, offered the precious relic for the king’s kiss. When Eugenius took down the sacred banner of France, the red and gold silk oriflamme, which left the abbey only on extraordinary occasions, and placed its gilded pike in Louis’s hands, the voices of the faithful sounded a triumphant roar. The sight of the crosses shimmering in the candlelight and of the sacred banner against Louis’s black pilgrim’s tunic
made victory seem a certainty.
Throughout the long consecration ceremony Eleanor wept, but whether from emotion or fatigue it was hard to say. Standing next to her mother-in-law, who was making a rare public apperance, Eleanor felt faint from the suffocating air and longed for Eugenius to end the proceedings by bestowing on Louis the traditional pilgrim’s wallet and pronouncing the blessing. “The crowds and the king’s wife and his mother, who nearly perished because of their tears and the heat, could not endure the delay; but to wish to depict the grief and wailing which occurred is as foolish as it is impossible.” Earlier that morning, Louis had visited a leper colony outside the gates of Paris and kissed some of its astonished inhabitants after asking their blessing, a stunt that Eleanor without doubt must have regarded as insane if not totally unnecessary. That day she had seen little of her husband, and now she watched his exhausted figure slip from the cathedral in the direction of the monk’s dormitory. That evening, while Louis and his retinue dined in the refectory with the brothers, Eleanor remained in the guest quarters of the abbey and concentrated on the morrow, which she had been awaiting so eagerly. The past year had been a time of hectic activity and almost incessant work of the type she most enjoyed, and even when there had been no more men to enlist or money to solicit, she had not been idle but spent the remaining weeks attending to personal preparations. Appreciative of the hardships that the journey might entail, she wanted to be prepared for every contingency and thus took the precaution of packing all items she might conceivably require. Into chests were folded layer upon layer of clothes so that she might change frequently on the road and present a smart appearance in Constantinople and Antioch. Let no one say that the queen of the Franks had entered the sophisticated cities of the East looking like a rustic. Into the chests also went a suitable collection of jewelry, wimples, slippers, cosmetics, belts, furs to ward off the cold, and veils to prevent sunburn. As insurance against bad weather she brought several tents; for sleeping comfort she carted along pallet beds with good mattresses for herself and her maids; to prevent illness—although she had exceptionally good health—there were carpets to cover the sodden earth. Other boxes held cooking utensils, bowls, goblets, washbasins, soap, napkins, and towels. Altogether, Eleanor’s personal belongings, along with those of the other noblewomen traveling on the expedition, filled a stupefying line of wagons, and some of the more experienced Crusaders found cause for complaint. They grumbled about excess baggage, about the presence of so many women with their chambermaids, and later, when mishaps occurred, they would remember those heavy wagon trains laden with feminine accoutrements.